


Nothing's Gonna Do You Harm (Except Yourself)

by Bella_Dahlia



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Assassin Jughead Jones, Crack Treated Seriously, F/M, Follow me down this rabbit hole, Gen, Is it sexual tension or is it spy work?, Jughead Jones Needs a Hug, Marvel Universe, Phil Coulson Is a Good Bro, Riverdale/Marvel AU, Spy Veronica Lodge, Veronica Lodge is So Done, no betas we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:27:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25883593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bella_Dahlia/pseuds/Bella_Dahlia
Summary: Veronica Lodge, once a top agent in the corrupt enterprise of Lodge Industries, is now one of SHIELD's best operatives. She's sent to take out a renegade assassin known as the Serpent Price.She makes a different call.______AKA the Riverdale/Marvel AU that probably no one but me asked for.
Relationships: Jughead Jones & Veronica Lodge, Jughead Jones/Veronica Lodge, Veronica Lodge & Phil Coulson
Comments: 18
Kudos: 57





	1. Chapter 1

The file dropped on the table in front of Veronica is… quite thick. 

Not as thick as her own personal file, but it’s got potential. 

She arches a single brow cooly, resisting the urge to lean over and dig into the depths of the pages. She has a reputation to uphold. Veronica Lodge isn’t eager. She doesn’t do impressed. 

“Be honest, Coulson, you refuse to go digital because of moments like these,” she says.

From the other side of the conference table, Veronica’s handler quirks a brow of his own. “You know me. I live for the drama.”

Two years ago, Veronica walked through the doors of the Triskelion and turned herself into SHIELD, leaving the world of crime she had been born and raised in. By pure chance Special Agent Coulson was the one sent in to take her statement, and after almost 10 days of being held while her debriefing was confirmed, he was the one who offered her a badge and the chance to redeem a lifetime of sins. He’s been her handler ever since. Depending on who you talk to, it’s either because Coulson is the best there is or just the biggest glutton for punishment. Either way, Veronica has no complaints. He lets her have a heavy hand in how she runs her ops, plenty of lateral room for improvisation, and he knows just how to write up the reports to keep their superiors from looking at anything too closely. It’s a happy marriage, as they say.

“So who is Bachelor Number One?” she asks.

SHIELD’s newest toy comes to life, a holographic screen generating directly over the conference table, courtesy of Blossom Industries. Crime scene photos of half a dozen different corpses are partly obscured by CCTV footage of one man fighting off four assailants and in the top left corner of it all, a single black and white surveillance photo blown up in lieu of a mugshot. The man in question wasn’t yet thirty, with a curly mop of dark hair falling down one side of his face. 

“Forsythe Pendleton Jones the Third,” Coulson tells her.

Veronica blinks--it’s the most surprise she’ll show, even to her handler. “The Serpent Prince? Word was he was taken out by his own crew. Betraying the one of the top five most elite assassin guilds typically has such repercussions.”

“Word was wrong, it would appear,” Coulson says, hitting a button. The CCTV footage freezes right when the man in the center of the action is mid kick, and gives them a decently clear view of his face. It’s the same guy. He hasn’t even bothered to cut his hair or grow a moustache. 

Veronica frowns slightly. “He’s certainly not trying hard to hide, is he?”

“Our intel from his time as a Serpent suggests he would be more than equipped to blend in if he wanted to,” Coulson agrees. “Makes one wonder why he isn’t.”

His tone remains as bland as ever, but Veronica shifts in her seat, crossing one leg over the other to hide the fidget. She recognizes the dig, and does not appreciate it. “Does it make SHIELD wonder, or just you?”

Coulson executes one of his elegant half shrugs and hits another button. The crime scene photos come to the forefront, six different men dead. Most are long range kills, the Prince was supposed to be the best sniper to come out of the Serpent Guild in three generations, but a couple are more creative. The one with his eyes burned out of his skull with a curling wand particularly stands out. 

“Now that we’re aware of Jones’s continued existence, we believe these freelance hits are his handiwork.”

“There’s a Yukuza leader and a cocaine kingpin in that pile,” Veronica points out.

“As well as an individual in the witness protection program and a mid level Interpol agent,” he says. “I believe the unofficial label for him is Loose Cannon.”

Veronica glances down at the paper file in front of her and finally flips it open. The first page is a picture of Jones with his father, FP, also known as the Serpent King. Jones is barely a teenager in the picture, shrinking under the weight of his father’s arm over his shoulder. It stirs an uncomfortable echo for her, one she would rather not face but at the same time cannot dismiss. 

“Loose Cannon doesn’t apply to him,” she says slowly. “Does SHIELD want him brought in or removed?”

“The recommendation is removal,” Coulson replies. Recommendation is their silently agreed upon code for ‘fuck what the order sheet says, do what you need to do’. She isn’t sure how Coulson manages to smooth what are supposed to be direct orders into things that are more flexible, but he’s made it clear it’s not her job to know. It’s her job to get it done. 

She nods once and closes the file. “Travel details?”

“Already uploaded; your flight is in three hours.” Coulson turns off the holoscreen. “See you on the other side, Agent Lodge.” 

“See you on the other side,” she agrees, standing. She’s halfway out the door, half thinking she might actually make it out without his last little jab, but it comes expertly timed, as usual.

“Why not a Loose Cannon then?” he asks, as if he doesn’t know the answer.

Veronica lets out a sigh, considers giving him the finger rather than responding. But she knows Coulson’s word is the only reason she doesn’t have to still come in for weekly psych evals and that he pulls shit like this because he needs to. “Loose cannon implies there’s no intentional target,” she explains. “He’s got a target.”

She waits the half a beat it takes for Coulson to decide he’s satisfied with the answer and nod, and then she’s out the door.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

She doesn’t tell Coulson, but she has met Forsythe before. 

The Serpents are assassins, an old guard company that has generations of business and family intertwining in an almost cult like atmosphere. Lodge Industries specializes in information and corporate espionage, a new world enterprise that has mafia roots but under the helm of her father Hiram has evolved into something more. The organizations have crossed paths multiple times, circling around each other’s business without outright encroaching on one another. Once, they even worked together.

Veronica attended the meeting, a silent observer as her father worked. She was newly twenty one, and in his eyes was ready to be groomed for a larger piece of the business. FP Jones, a zealot to the flair of the underworld, refused Hiram's invitation to come to their corporate offices and insisted on a back alley restaurant in Chinatown that was stuffed into a basement under a dry cleaner’s. They all sat at a circular table, a single curved booth seat wrapping around it. Hiram and FP needed to be directly opposite one another, which left Forsythe and Veronica shoved in the middle, picking at dim sum and trying to not eye each other too obviously. 

When he thought she was suitably distracted, he attempted to steal a dumpling off her plate, his chopsticks shooting out with both accuracy and speed. Veronica blocked his progress at the last possible moment, her chopsticks entangling with his own, and she silently raised an eyebrow as she looked at him. 

Forsythe met her gaze easily. “You weren’t eating it,” he pointed out in a murmur, so as to not disturb the larger conversation at the table. 

“Not the point,” she replied, her voice soft and demure, a sharp construct to the quick hard flick her chopsticks gave his, sending his hand away from her plate. 

“Oh, _vuida negra_ ,” he said, and Veronica had to suppress a grimace from hearing her father’s codename for her coming out of a stranger’s mouth. She didn’t like it to begin with, but now that it was catching on in larger circles, she hated it outright. “We’re villains. Do we need a point?”

Even then she had heard the bitterness in his tone, seen the despair thinly veiled in his eyes. At the time she had felt scornful towards him; it felt so amateurish to her, letting his emotions play so clearly on his face, allowing his disdain for his father and their business to be so easy for a stranger to read.

It was only years later, when Veronica sat in a windowless room waiting for SHIELD to decide if she was a worthwhile asset or a criminal to be detained, that she considered perhaps he did it on purpose. Perhaps he allowed himself to be read like an open book because when he sat next to another Heir Apparent, he recognized the way she was slowly dying on the inside.


	2. Chapter 2

The party is, on the surface, a charity gala supporting an orphanage run by a convent. Under that surface, it’s a human trafficking auction selling half a dozen of the orphans off to the highest bidder. 

Only a select few of the guests are aware of the party’s secondary purpose. Veronica’s cover is one of them.

She sweeps the auburn strands of her wig behind one shoulder, silently ticking off the various men--and two women--who undress her with their eyes with varying degrees of subtlety. None of them are Jones, however, so she ditches her glass of champagne and moves into the next room. The Italian villa, nestled near the coast, is sprawling, and should ideally have at least three agents to cover the square footage, but she’s here alone. Working solo is her speciality, and why she’s often tasked with this particular kind of mission. In her head, she refers to them as Kiss or Kill. 

_But sometimes it’s both_ , she thinks, just as her gaze lands on her target. He’s on the other side of the courtyard that’s become the dance hall for the duration of the party, leaning blasphemously against a statue of the Virgin Mary. His three piece suit is tailored, his hair is well coiffed, and his smile is slight but somehow still charming. Just attractive enough to register as pleasing, but nothing to make him stand out as memorable to a regular passerby. It’s a fine line to walk, and he does it well. 

Veronica takes the long way around the courtyard, observing Jones while she weaves through other guests. He’s good at looking almost bored, but she sees the way he’s keeping Giovanni Cremona in his sight. The auction provides a plethora of potential targets for an assassin of his caliber, but she knew Cremona would be the mark before she ever made it to the party. He’s the only participant in the auction who likes little boys that’s done business with the Serpent Guild. 

She makes it to the other side of the Virgin Mary just as Forsythe’s pushing out of his lean. One of her hands catches hold of his and with a swift, firm tug she has him spinning right into her waiting embrace. Her hand twists in his, bringing his arm up in a frame, while her other hand lands lightly on his shoulder. Even with confusion fluttering across his features, he instinctively responds, his free hand resting at her waist and bringing her body snug against his. They’re two steps into an intimate waltz before she sees the recognition dawn on his face.

“Well, well, this is a surprise,” he comments. “Last I heard you were in a windowless room in Daddy Dearest’s basement enduring some unspeakable punishments for disappointing him.”

“Funny, I was just about to point out all the gossip that has the Serpent King keeping your mummified head on a stick in his office for betraying him,” she replies.

“Rumors, greatly exaggerated, you know the drill.”

For a moment they dance in silence, but plenty is communicated without words. He tests the grip of her hand in his, his lead becomes more aggressive to see how she’ll respond. She lets it pass, allowing him control.

For now. 

He spins her out under his arm, and she half expects him to use the opportunity to ditch her, to get back to his task at hand. But he brings her back in, and rather than having his hand move back into position at her hip, it slips to her back, his thumb grazing against the bare skin her gown leaves exposed. It’s a solid tactic, trying to establish intimacy and even desire, but he seems to be forgetting this is what Veronica is known for. She responds with the hand on his shoulder, sliding it along the crisp lines of his suit until her manicured nails can rake through the hair at the nape of his neck, fingertips twisting at the hint of curls. 

“Despite my hopes and dreams, I’m guessing this isn’t merely a social call, _viuda_.”

Veronica bats her lashes up at him. He’s still got inches on her, even in the sky high heels she’s become so accomplished at maneuvering in. “Why wouldn’t I want to find time to catch up with my very favorite Born Into This Life of Crime Cohort?”

He huffs out a slight laugh. “Sure, you come in here, dressed like this, just to shoot the shit with me.”

Now Veronica allows a hint of a smile to break through. “Dressed like what now, _le petit prince_?”

Forsythe’s head dips down until their hairlines almost meet. Any outside observer would register it as a sweet moment, the two of them lingering in each other’s space, close enough to be sharing each other’s air. “Don’t deny you’re here to kill me, Lodge,” he murmurs. “It’d be rude.”

“... It’s not the only option on the table,” she says after a moment. “Let’s go someplace more comfortable and discuss alternatives.”

His eyes are bluer than she remembers, but the pain swimming in his gaze is very familiar. “Why are you trying to save this creep?”

“I’m not,” she says. He starts to lift his head, but she drags her fingertips down the length of his jaw, demanding his attention. “I’m trying to save you, Jones.”

The hollow sound that comes out of his mouth might be called a laugh by someone. Not Veronica though; she recognizes the sound too well to mistake it. “That’s not our part to play. Not either of us.” He turns his head just enough to press his lips into her palm, a flash of heat singing across her skin, and then he does spin her away. Despite her best intentions, he had created just enough of a distraction with the boldness of the kiss to make her hesitate when she should have held on tighter. In a single turn of her heel, he disappears, melting back into the crowd. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After dinner, Hiram took his daughter by the elbow and told her to “keep the young man entertained”, which actually meant “keep him out of my goddamn hair”. According to her father’s way of doing things, she needed to cater to Forsythe’s every whim and flatter him at every turn, which is why she sat elegantly perched on a stool while he threw darts.

According to her own experience and intuition about people, Veronica knew the younger Jones would find Lodge hospitality insufferable, which is why she insulted him while he did it.

“I haven’t seen someone look that pleased with themselves for throwing something a whole eight feet since my nephew’s tenth birthday party.”

Forysthe shot her a look from the toeline, and threw the remaining dart in his hand without looking. It sank perfectly in place, in the tiny slot left between darts five and six, finishing the circle around the first dart he had thrown, the bullseye. “Jealousy is not a great color on you, V.”

Veronica let out a laugh, light with just a hint of disdain, her free hand coming up to toy with the pearls laced around her neck while she leaned forward on her elbows on the table. She carefully constructed her haughty persona with just enough unaffected sex appeal to be enticing rather than offputting. A challenge without being a threat. Men did so love a chase, so long as they were guaranteed to win. 

“Oh yes, jealous of the ability to strike my opponents only when at an incredibly safe distance to avoid being struck back,” she said. “I’ll happily keep my skill set, thank you.”

She took a sip of her drink, turning her face away from him but keeping her body in his direction. Forsythe closed the distance, coming back to his side of the small table and mirroring her position, resting his weight forward on his elbows. “Which skill set is that, talking men to death?”

“I got you to rejoin me at the table when I wanted you, didn’t I?”

Forsythe blinked and opened his mouth to argue, but thought better of it and only let out a chuckle. “This is why I do my best work at a distance,” he agreed. “I can avoid pleasant distractions.”


	3. Chapter 3

Veronica doesn’t realize her mistake until it’s too late.

After losing Jones in the crowd, she finds Cremona and sticks to him, or at least close enough to him to spot any would be assassins. It’s only when the select elite guests are being escorted out of the larger crowd to partake in the more exclusive event, and Veronica is being taken upstairs to the rooftop patio instead of down into the basement where any reasonable human trafficking auction would take place, that she realizes Forsythe left the villa long ago. 

She starts to take the steps two at a time, knowing Cremona is hitting the patio deck just ahead of her. She reaches him as he’s greeting the host at the top of the stairs, her hand brushing his arm to get his attention. Cremona turns to her, and as he does a thin whistle cuts through the air and Veronica watches, wide eyed, as a steel tipped arrow embeds itself in the man’s chest. He has a moment of unprocessed horror on his face, confusion at what he’s seeing and feeling, and meets Veronica’s gaze just long enough as if to ask “how did you manage that one, pretty lady?” before crumpling down in a dead heap at her feet. 

The shit show that is various villains of the week scrambling to save their skin is bad enough. The small team of CIA agents there to bust the auction ring (and have just been set back probably two years in their efforts) are a whole new level of crap.

SHIELD protocol dictates that when an op goes this tits up, she should break cover and cooperate with the other agency. Maintaining civil relations with their bureaucratic beathren is a high priority, always. The trouble is, Veronica knows if she does, she’ll lose Jones. If she loses him now, the task will be reassigned, probably to a blunt instrument like Clayton (who likes to shoot first and ask questions never), and she can’t let that happen. 

So she runs.

There’s only one building surrounding the villa the shot could have come from, she just needs to get to it. In the chaos on the patio, Veronica is able to slip to one side, out of thick of the fray. She pulls one of the knives strapped to her thigh and nicks the silk of her gown where the slit ends on her leg, then with two quick tugs rips the floor length fabric away, creating a much more manageable mini skirt. As she tucks the knife back in place, she kicks off her heels and scoops them up by the straps, and heads down. The security is easy to get past--one guard does end up with a stiletto jutting out of the side of his neck, and Veronica will have a nasty bruise on one elbow, but all in all, a smooth journey. She’s making the last turn on the staircase, about to hit the final landing before she gets to the ground floor, when two CIA agents appear directly in her path, guns drawn.

“CIA, on your knees!”

Veronica halts, the balls of her feet balanced on the edge of the stair. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to take me at my word that we’re on the same side here?”

She watches the two agents exchange looks, before doubling down on their intimidating glares.

She sighs. “Hard way it is then.”

Veronica takes her remaining shoe and flings it at the agent standing slightly further down the stairs. While he bats it away successfully, it distracts him from noticing the small round disc that she threw at the same time, which lands on his chest. It activates on impact, shooting an electrical current that makes his body seize and then tumble back down the last few stairs to the ground floor.

While agent one is going down, Veronica takes care of agent two. She gets some speed down the stairs to then launch herself at the wall, using it as leverage to get enough height to get her legs up on his shoulders. One of her heels digs into his ribs as she stabilizes, and she grabs the steel reinforced nylon spool hidden in her bracelet, pulling the thread out and using it to strangle him. The agent twists and stumbles, his gun falling forgotten, one hand steadying himself against the wall, the other clawing blindly at her.

“Down, down, down the stairs, big guy,” Veronica grinds out, yanking the thread tighter. He stumbles down two steps but then gets a firm grip on the gold chain belt around her waist and yanks, hard. She feels her balance slipping and moves with it, her legs locking around his neck as she drops, leaving her hanging upside down from his shoulders. It has the unfortunate side effect of putting her crotch close to his face.

“Well, this is awkward,” she mutters, right before releasing her grip on him entirely. When she unlocks her legs, one goes straight up in the air while the other shoves off from his chest as hard as she can. It sends him flying back into the wall of the stairwell, head cracking hard against the stone, while she catches herself on her hands and twists to complete a backwards handspring down the stairs. She lands on her bare feet, flipping the red hair on her head back off of her face, and takes a single moment to assess the carnage. Both agents unconscious, one with a likely nasty concussion, but they’d live. 

She looks down at the feet of the smaller of the two and grimaces. Loafers really don’t go with the outfit, but it would have to do.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“You know, my father is under the impression before the night is over we’re going to be announcing an alliance by marriage.”

In a rare moment of actually being caught completely off guard, Veronica choked on her drink. Only slightly, her composure back in the space of a breath, but she knew Forsythe saw from the way he smiled at her. It was the only smile he gave her the whole night that reached his eyes. 

At some point he had moved his stool to be closer to hers, sitting side by side rather than across from each other. He absent-mindedly folded paper airplanes out of napkins while they spoke, sending them off in random directions throughout the bar. He had an impressive habit of getting them to land in other people’s drinks. 

“Your father is aware we’re not 17th century nobles, right, or is he really that crazy?”

He shrugged, that smile still tugging at the corners of his mouth. “It’s not unheard of, even now. Not in the old families of crime.”

“Yes, emphasis on old, which we Lodges are not,” Veronica agreed.

“Kind of my point,” he said, nodding his head towards the opposite end of the bar where their parents sat. “Lodge Industries may have legitimacy in the corporate world, but it doesn’t in the Organizations. You could be Hiram’s ticket.”

“My father would never sell me off,” she said, but even as the words left her mouth, they felt brittle and ready to crack, like plastic left too long in the sun. 

He raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t he? Wouldn’t they both?” He raised his glass to his lips, for the first time that night drinking the whiskey he ordered hours before. “You could have much worse offers, y’know. It could even be a little tempting, being a Princess, don’t you think?”

She looked at him appraisingly, not bother trying to hide it but rather emphasizing her critical eye. His boyish good looks, with the flinty edge of his cynicism running underneath them. The dry humor, the clear intelligence, with a refreshing lack of homicidal paranoia that so many in their business seemed to cultivate. 

Added bonus, he was clearly good with his hands.

Still, Veronica had enough problems trying to navigate her increasingly conflicted feelings with her own family’s business. Becoming entangled in another sounded decidedly worse.

“You looking for your Rose, _le petit Prince_?” she finally asked. “I’m sorry to say, I wouldn’t do well sheltered in glass.”

Forsythe looked at her incredulously. “So how’s that current pearl encrusted cage treating you?”

All the warmth he had managed to tease out of her over the course of the night dissipated in an instant. Veronica shuttered off her expression and any good will she previously felt. She finished her drink, letting the heavy glass hit the table with a definitive thunk. “See you in another life, Jones.”

“To another life, Veronica.” He held his glass up to her in a salute, and let her walk away without further comment.


	4. Chapter 4

It takes three tries to find the right room in the crumbling heap that was once another villa. By the time Veronica gets to him, she’s winded, and more than a little irritated. Only someone insane would set up shop in such a dangerous space, so what does it say about her that she’s willingly moving through it?

As she pushes open the door a crossbow bolt whizzes by her ear, slicing strands of her wig before embedding in the wall behind her. Veronica doesn’t flinch but she does narrow her eyes in the direction of Jones, who sits perched in a windowsill opposite the door, a mostly smoked cigarette dangling from his lips and a single hand crossbow resting on his thighs. 

“Goddammit, Jones, you’re lucky that wasn’t my real hair,” she tells him, entering the room and letting the door bang closed behind her.

“You’re lucky I wasn’t aiming for between your eyes,” he responds, slightly muffled as he speaks around the cigarette. He takes one last drag before flicking it out the open window. 

Veronica just rolls her eyes. For a moment there’s only silence, an unspoken battle of wills in their eyes, until she takes a step further into the room. The crossbow flys back up, trained on her. 

“That’s plenty close, _viuda_ ,” he says. “Catching up has been a delight, but you’re not coming any closer.”

“Please, you’re not going to shoot me. I only play dumb to pump assholes for information, y’know, I can recognize a suicide run when I see one.”

A smile ghosts across his face, so pained it actually makes Veronica feel a little hurt just to see it. “I’m not interested in Hiram Lodge’s offer for alternate business models, or whatever bullshit line he sent you here to sell.”

Now Veronica feels a hurt altogether her own. She hadn’t expected the accusation of still working for her father to hit her like a hole in the chest but it does. “I no longer represent my father’s business interests,” she says after a moment. “I haven’t for some time. I’m here on behalf of SHIELD.”

She meets his gaze steadily, wanting him to see the truth held there. It’s something she’s had decidedly less practice at, so she’s not as confident in the skill. 

“...Well, SHIELD is just as good as CIA in my book,” he says slowly, and tosses the crossbow over his shoulder, out the open window. “Either way I’m not dying slowly at the hands of Dear Old Dad, so I’ll take it.” 

“Jones, I don’t think you…”

“It does raise the question why you didn’t just off me when you had the chance.”

Veronica lets out a small huff. She’s tired, she’s cranky, and he’s managing to get under her skin in a manner very few are able to accomplish. “Maybe because I’m not here to kill you, doofus.”

“Doofus? Ouch.” He unfolds his long limbs from the window sill and stands, closing the distance between the two of them. Now in her borrowed men’s dress shoes, she’s laughably small beside his height, but all she notices is the heat radiating off his suit from sitting in the sun. “If you’re SHIELD, then of course you’re here to kill me,,” he insists, his voice dropping into a murmur. “I’m a bad, rude man.”

“Last I checked, rudeness was insufferable, not irredeemable.”

He quirks a brow. “The eighty seven lives I’ve snuffed out might beg to disagree with you.”

Veronica swallows, pushing back the impulse to lie her way through this. She’s spent so much of her life constructing what she knows other people want to hear, but it won’t work on him. If she wants a chance at keeping him alive, she has to offer him honesty. 

“I’ve been where you are. I’ve tried what you’re trying.” She reaches up, tugging her wig off and letting her dark locks fall free around her shoulders. “I found myself suffocating under the weight of everything I had done and would potentially keep doing for my father and I wanted nothing more than to just… be done.”

“And then SHIELD found you?” he supplies.

She shakes her head. “I found them. After nearly disintegrating during a shitty weapons sale gone wrong, I realized I couldn’t die with all this....” She pauses, struggling to find the right words, her gaze dropping to a point beyond him. “I got red in my ledger,” she finally mutters. “I’d like to wipe it out.”

“That pesky Catholicism getting the best of you.” When she looks up, she sees a gentleness in his expression that takes all the bite out of his words. “I… I’m glad you got out, V. Really. But I’m not the kind of guy who SHIELD is going to consider an asset.”

“Of course they will,” she insists breezily. “Perhaps you forgot, but I am very good at getting what I want.”

He tilts his head curiously to one side and one of his hands hovers close to her arm, close enough for her to feel the phantom of a touch. It dances over her like an electrical current, humming with potential. “What is it that you want?”

She looks up at him through her lashes. For the first time in years, she feels a desire to reach out to someone with no ulterior motive, no mission parameters dictating her moves. She feels his pain and confusion, his desperate want to have hope in something. She feels everything he’s feeling, he wears it all so plainly out in the open. It’s almost intoxicating, seeing someone so free with their emotions. She wouldn’t even know where to begin, but she feels a sudden, desperate urge to press into his arms and ask him to show her how. 

“I want to give you the same chance that was given to me,” she murmurs. “We don’t have to be the people our parents demanded of us, Forsythe. We can make other choices.”

“... Call me Jughead.”

Veronica blinks. “Ah. Well. It’s not worse than Forsythe--”

A slight grin splits his face. “Fuck you.”

“--Can’t really say it’s better, either.”

“My baby sister wanted to call me a blockhead when she was six, but she couldn’t remember the phrase,” he explains. “She kept it up after that. It’s… It’s the only name I’ve ever had that doesn’t make me want to claw my eyes out.”

A warmth blooms in Veronica’s chest that comes out in a gentle smile. “Alright, Jughead. Coulson’s definitely going to give you a different codename in the field, though, he wants us all to sound like superheroes.”

Jughead steps back from her, and though she mourns the sudden loss of his presence, he’s grabbing a rucksack from the corner of the room, and she can’t complain about the idea of leaving this deathtrap.

“What’s your codename then?”

Veronica grimaces slightly. “We decided to keep Black Widow.”

He stops short, looking confused. “SHIELD’s Black Widow is Russian, out of that weird defunct KGB experiment gone wrong, everyone knows that.”

She just stares at him blankly.

“Right. Spy. Cover stories are part of the package, I guess,” he says. “Hey, does that mean I get to come up with a cover story for me too?”

They head out of the room, and Veronica lets Jughead take the lead down the stairs. She figures if where he steps can successfully take his weight, she won’t have to worry about falling through.

“You’ll work one out with Coulson, after you’re debriefed,” she assures him. “Why, have something in mind?”

“I’m thinking circus performer.” 

She doesn’t know whether to groan or laugh.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nearly three weeks later, Veronica insists on being the one to bring Jughead his clearance paperwork.

She pushes open the door to his room without knocking, a stack of folders balanced in one hand, a paper bag full of greasy food clutched in the other. He has a real weakness for burgers, she discovered on day four when he bemoaned being unable to visit the outside world while Coulson was still working his Handler magic. She has to admit, she likes the onion rings. 

“Christ, V, I know no one else here has to respect my privacy, but you could show some decency.” Jughead is sprawled on the tiny loveseat in his quarters, a terry cloth bathrobe with the SHIELD logo emblazoned on the lapel wrapped loosely around him. Despite his protests, he makes no move to get properly dressed, his eyes still on the dog-eared copy of Dune he’s reading. 

“I can take my good mood and my cheeseburgers elsewhere, you know,” she shoots back, dropping the folders on the kitchenette counter with a thud.

He perks up at the mention of food, dropping the book and clamoring off of the furniture to standing. The belt on the bathrobe is dangerously close to slipping open, but he seems utterly unaware as he comes up behind her and tries to grab the meal. 

She makes a tsking noise in her throat and brings the bag in close to her chest as she turns to face him. Trying to hold the food out of his grasp would be an exercise in futility, her only option to protect it is to bring it in. “Stop, stop it. This is celebratory junk food, we need to savor the moment.”

Jughead’s blue eyes suddenly light up, making him look more boyish than his twenty nine years. “You mean…?’

“Oh, I mean.” Veronica allows herself a smile, something she’s been doing more of since bringing Jughead in. He brings out smiles, and eye rolls, amusement and vexation, often all in the same sitting. It’s amazing how irritating he can be, actually, and frustrating just how much she seems to enjoy it regardless. She reaches into her back pocket and pulls out his official on site SHIELD badge, which he grabs eagerly. “Say hello to Level 7, Hawkeye.”

“Hawkeye?” he groans. “Seriously, that’s what Coulson landed on?”

“I talked him off the Bullseye ledge, Jug, I’m a spy, I’m not a miracle worker.”

He looks up from the badge, still clutched in both hands like the newest toy unwrapped at Christmas, and smiles at her. She does her best to ignore how it makes her want to turn into a happy puddle at his feet. “Veronica. _Thank you._ ”

She can’t remember the last time someone thanked her like that; like they truly meant it. She waves it off with her free hand, and moves to grab plates, but it’s all a cover to give her time to put on her unaffected facade. 

“Don’t thank me yet, Jug, I have yet to figure out how to make your archaic choice in weaponry cool.”

Jughead scowls at her when she hands him a plate loaded with cheeseburgers and fries. “Archery is elegant, accurate, and doesn’t need to be wrapped in Prada to be cool. What’s so cool about having glorified tasers on your wrists?”

“For one, my bracelets are designed by Mikimoto, and therefore are eternally iconic.”

For the second time Jughead’s door opens without announcement, this time their Handler walking through the door. Both Veronica and Jughead toss out a quick “Hey Coulson,” as a greeting, but their attention is solely on one another and the bickering at hand. 

“Secondly, I have a lot more going for me than the Widow Bites, unlike your ever versatile ‘Imma shoot this from a ridiculously far distance’ method of dealing with danger.”

Veronica hands a plate over to Coulson as she walks past him, not breaking her stride to follow Jughead to the loveseat. He’s sprawling again, slouched over more than half of the space, and she has to kick at his ankle with a booted foot to get him to move. He rolls his eyes and grudgingly lifts his legs to give her space to sit, only to drop them down into her lap immediately.

“If you consider Death by Thighs as another category of weaponry, I guess maybe,” Jughead says, one of his bare feet nudging at her knees.

Veronica glares at him and flicks the bottom of his foot. He does his best to not flinch, but she knows exactly how ticklish he is, information she previously gleaned from a sparring session in his monitored gym time. “Don’t test me, _Hawkeye_ ,” she says. “You precious sniper stats won’t help you in close quarters combat.”

“Calm down, _Widow_ , or I’m going to begin to think you want to fight,” he snarks back, eyebrows raised.

Coulson comes around to sit in the unoccupied armchair that faces them. He’s ditched the fastfood, content to sit with his hands folded neatly in his lap. “I see we’ve moved past the existential sadness and moral crises,” he says in that pleasantly bland tone he’s so good at employing.

For the first time, Jughead looks in his direction. “I mask my pain with snark and emotional eating,” he deadpans, his voice muffled by the half a cheeseburger currently crammed in his mouth.

Coulson just turns his gaze silently on Veronica, as if to ask ‘and what’s your excuse?’

Veronica pauses with an onion ring almost to her mouth, puts on her most innocent expression. “I’m just shamelessly coddling him, I’m still dead on the inside."

Coulson nods slowly, Veronica recognizes it as his ‘you’re so full of shit’ expression, but he lets it go. “Well then, now that we’ve cleared that up, are you ready for your first assignment?”

“Whaddya say, V?” Jughead asks. His tone is light, but when she looks at his face she sees the nervousness behind his eyes. “Ready to drop being a solo act for a little while?”

When Veronica left the family business, she did so with the knowledge that she would be alone. She wanted to help, wanted to be something more, but she knew even if SHIELD accepted her, she would always be an outsider. Double agents by nature are hard to trust, and so many of SHIELD’s ranks were purists, spurred to sign up to defend their country from a childhood love of truth, justice, and Captain America. With her dark outlook and darker past, she settled into the experience of never fitting it.

But Jughead changes that. She might claim she spent so much of the last three weeks with him for his benefit, but Coulson isn’t naive. She looks over at Jughead now, with his third burger in hand, with his wet hair falling in his eyes and his legs still stretched over her lap, and she doesn’t know how she could stand being alone again. 

“Let’s see what damage we can do as a duo.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for coming with me on this silly short ride! I haven't managed a short one shot in some time, I really wanted to do something a little different (and something I wouldn't leave hanging as a long term WIP) as a sort of mental break from the more sprawling pieces I keep plucking away at. 
> 
> Which of course isn't to say I don't have ideas for how to continue this too, because you better believe I have the full Riverdale transmuted to Avengers list shaking around in my head and boy howdy could there be some stories. But they'll be saved for a different day.
> 
> As always, thank you for reading; for the kudos and the comments. They do a body good, friends.


End file.
